Neville Longbottom, Heir of Gryffindor
by Dryad7
Summary: People raised their glasses to him-"Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived." This story, though, is not about Harry. Although it was true-Harry was alive-the story that was told was false. Harry Potter was never the Chosen One. Neville Longbottom was.
1. Chapter 1

1: You may be thinking, "Why should I read this story? The author has a history of leaving stories unfinished."

You would be correct. However, I now have something which I lacked before: an alpha reader! Having someone who lives in the same room with you constantly asking, "Can I read more yet? Have you written more yet?" is a great incentive to finish stories. This story is already three chapters written, and I hope to continue posting every 1-2 weeks between now and the end of the story with few-to-none interruptions in that schedule. If you are till listening, thank you for your patience.

And now, without further ado, the second note.

2: This is an alternate universe story. As such, it deviates rather early from the universe J.K. Rowling envisioned. Therefore, though I am going to be as true to the spirit of the original novels as possible, sometimes my timelines and character relationships will not match up perfectly.

On a side note, did you know that the full moon closest to the day Harry was born was on the 28, three days prior?

And NOW without further ado, the actual story.

…_.._

_**Chapter 1: He Wasn't Trying…**_

_"Lily and James… I didn't want to believe it, Albus… Why couldn't he kill Harry?" The stern matriarch was rendered incoherent by her grief. _

_"We can only guess, my dear Professor." Albus Dumbledore said gravely. "We may never know."_

_"Can't you do something about his scar, Albus?" _

_"Even if I could, I wouldn't. Scars can come in handy." _

_They left him on the doorstep of Number Four, Privet Drive, a letter laid atop his blankets. Harry Potter sighed and curled around his letter, not knowing that his parents were dead and he was alone, not knowing that he would be woken by the shrill screams of his aunt in an hour, not knowing that all across the country, in hidden enclaves people raised their glasses to him- "To Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived." _

_This story, though, is not about Harry. Although it was true-Harry _was_ alive-the story that was told, wizard to wizard, friend to friend, all across England, was false. _

_Harry Potter was never hit with the Killing Curse. _

…

Frank and Alice Longbottom were a very normal married couple. They lived in a small cottage near Longbottom Manor (home to Lady Augusta Longbottom, matriarch of their clan, and Frank's mother) with their small son Neville. Frank worked with a nearby potions supplier as an herbologist. He was not exceptional, but he was decent, and they were relatively well-off.

Their closest friends were James and Lily Potter; thus, they were quite excited when their sons were born on the same muggy night in July. At least, the men were. The women were rather… distracted.

…

The mediwitch brought out the first small bundle. Tousled black hair peeked out from the edge of the blanket, and the child was deposited in James' shaking arms.

"It's a boy." she said briskly. "Make sure to support his head." She trotted off to care for her other patient.

"A son." James Potter said, wonderingly. "I have a son."

Frank barely gave him a nod as the second bundle was deposited in his arms. He gave an incoherent affirmation to the mediwitch when she said that this, too, was a boy, and that he was not to unwrap him or drop him, or anything of that sort. She did not seem to think very highly of the intelligence of new fathers.

As soon as she left, Frank pulled the cloth from around his son's head, and gazed at it in awe. This was his child; he was a father. The world suddenly became something that was to be defended against, rather than laughed at and battled. He took in his son's features for a while, then his face crinkled in concern.

"He's bald, James! Are they supposed to be bald?"

"Mine's not. See? Hair like his father."

"What did I do? Will he be bald his whole life? Is there something we can do about this?"

"I don't know. We can talk to the mediwitch…"

"Yes!" Frank rushed into the room, where he was brought up short by the sight of his exhausted and lovely wife. She smiled at him tiredly.

Unthinkingly, he lowered his voice. "How are you?"

She gave a weary laugh. "I'm fine, Frank. May I hold our son?"

Automatically, he handed over the bundle, then remembered why he had come in in the first place. "He's bald, Alice! What are we supposed to do? Do they have a potion for that?"

Enthralled by her son, Alice took a few moments to answer. "It'll grow, Frank. He actually already has hair; it's just too light and fine for you to see. Come feel."

He stood there and allowed his wife to guide his hand over his son's hair, captivated by this tiny miracle. The mediwitch bustled back in and sighed. Young parents. They never listened, did they?

"What's his name?" she asked brusquely, but not unkindly.

"Hmmm?" Frank responded. "His name's Neville. Neville Augustus Longbottom."

From the other room, the sounds of raucous merriment echoed as Sirius Black joined the Potters. In this room, though, for a few moments in the midst of a war, there was peace.

…..

_About a year later..._

"WHERE IS HE?"

Frank blessed the Ministry and its bureaucratic slowness. Had it not been for the constant stonewalling from officious, stupid ministers like Fudge in Recordkeeping, Harry Potter might have already joined them in their cottage. That would be one more life that would fall to Bellatrix's wand.

He regretted being unable to save his family. Bellatrix Lestrange was crazy, true, but she had an excellent grasp of strategy. Somehow she and her cohorts had gotten in under the wards he had placed, and immediately immobilized him and taken his wand. Now she, together with young Bartemius Crouch, were trying to torture the location of Harry Potter from him in an effort to somehow resurrect the Dark Lord.

_Blessings to you Ministry, and to you, Dumbledore, for not letting me know. _He thought grimly, as pain wracked his body. He could feel his nerves going. Soon he would reach oblivion, as his beloved Alice already had. With his last bit of control, he gave her a smile as the last Crucio he would ever feel hit him. His last memory was of Peter Pettigrew walking into the room…

_But Peter, why?..._

….

Wormtail was stuck. He had never been very brave; he had relied on his friends to provide courage, and once they had friends and jobs after school, he had no life. No goals. Nothing. He was alone.

Now he was hanging onto whoever would promise him the most security. That had looked like Voldemort, once; he had betrayed James for that security, and it had disappeared. He had taken Bellatrix as the Dark Lord's replacement; she was crazy, but she was better than turning himself in to the Ministry and submitting to the dementors. For her, he betrayed Frank and Alice.

As he scampered around the house, trying to escape the screams of his former friends, he found a crib. Transforming back into human shape, he silently approached it.

There was a baby.

Intinctually, he started to call out to Bella, but hushed. Why should he betray a baby to her? What had the baby done to him?

_What had Frank ever done to him?_

He squashed that thought. The babe stirred. What was his name? Neville, that was it. Cruel, to give that name to a baby. Neville opened his eyes and saw a stranger, and screwed up his face to scream.

"_Somnius_," whispered Peter hastily.

Neville's face went slack.

For a few minutes, Peter watched him sleep and was confronted with himself.

This was one life he could save, at no cost to himself. Maybe it would count to his favor.

He turned and quietly shut the door, and began to walk back to his partners in crime. Just in time, though, he heard the Aurors coming and transformed, disappearing quickly from the house.

Alastor Moody entered the nursery next, and picked up his grandnephew. "Come on, Neville." he said gruffly.

The tiny head stirred, then curled into the crook of Moody's arm. They left the house behind, as Frank and Alice's unresponsive bodies were portkeyed to St. Mungo's.

…


	2. Chapter 2

_**Chapter 2: It Is Our Choices**_

A large manor lay shrouded in a drizzly rain. Inside, a small, tow-headed boy dashed across the hall into the closet, then giggled. It was his favorite game; he would sneak around the house, trying to keep from being caught. He didn't think he was actually doing anything wrong, but the thrill of 'getting away' with something was too entrancing not to try. It was relatively safe, too; with only two old women in the house, he could be relatively certain of not being caught. Still, there was the chance that one of them might turn a corner at an inopportune moment. Could he hide in time?

He snuck down the hall, tiny feet padding on the thick carpet. Today, he was going to try something that, though it was not strictly forbidden, was generally frowned-upon.

He was sneaking into the west wing.

Carpet abruptly gave way to marble, and tapestried walls to great windows stretching from ceiling almost to the floor. He halted, suddenly feeling very small.

He tiptoed, now, out of a hushed sense of not-belonging, rather than little-boy stealth. Each step echoed off the ceiling, miles away. He halted in from of what was apparently the centerpiece of the room: two paintings, hanging side-by-side. There was a beautiful woman and a stern-looking man. They looked strangely familiar, as if he should know who they were. He drew closer, head cocked to one side. If only they would _move-_

"What d'you think you're doing, boy?" came a gruff voice from the shadows.

He jumped, and tried to scurry out, but instead ran smack-dab into a leg. He stumbled back, then looked up and screamed before passing out.

…

Alastor 'Mad-Eye' Moody looked down at his nephew and sighed.

He scooped the small boy up. He couldn't send Neville back to Augusta like this; he would have to wait for the boy to awaken on his own.

He hobbled quietly back to his quarters with his small burden.

…..

Neville woke up in a dark, shabby room. A fire was crackling in the corner, with two large chairs in front of it. The scary man was nowhere to be seen. He eased out of the enormous bed and began to tiptoe toward the door.

"Where d'you think you're going, boy?"

He froze. He eyed the door for a moment, wondering if he could make it before the scary man got to him.

"You can't make it, boy."

Now he eyed the chair that the voice was clearly issuing from, wondering if the scary man could read minds, and if so, how he was supposed to get away. A small thought crept into his mind: how did the scary man get here in the first place?...

"Come, sit with me." the voice from the armchair rasped.

Neville mustered up all his little-boy courage, swelled his chest, and stalked bravely up to the man. He climbed resolutely into the empty armchair, scooted back as far as he could, and crossed his arms. Only then did he work up the nerve to look at the man sitting across from him.

He was hideous. Every visible surface of his body was covered in scars; there was a chunk of his nose missing, and one whole leg gone; worst of all, though was his eye. One eye was a normal chocolate brown, like Neville's own; the other was blue, electric blue, spinning madly in its socket like something out of a nightmare.

Neville shuddered and fixed his gaze on the man's normal eye.

"Yes, sir?" he quavered. His voice did not sound half as brave as he meant it to; it was far too high and squeaky.

The man was silent for a moment. "Do you know who was in those portraits, boy?"

Neville schooled himself. "No, sir." he said very precisely, with not an ounce of quaver.

The man snorted. "Those are your parents." he uttered with finality, as if that should explain everything.

They lapsed into silence. Neville waited for what seemed like forever. Finally, he asked, "Did you know them?"

The man turned an eye on him, and Neville hastily added, "Sir."

After a long pause, the man said, "Your father was my nephew."

Neville sat and tried to puzzle this out for a long while. The man waited until he gave up, then said, voice colored by amusement, "That makes you my great-nephew."

Neville nodded gravely, as if he had expected this was the case.

This time, it was the man waiting for a response. Neville was determined to outwait him, though.

The man laughed. "You can call me Uncle Moody, boy. It's probably about time we got you back to your half of the house."

"Yes, sir." Neville said as he slid down out of the chair.

It was the first of many rainy afternoons spent in the west wing.

….

The nine-year-old boy wiped his brow as he finished cleaning his aunt's kitchen.  
Harry Potter could not remember a time before he lived with his aunt and uncle and cousins. He did remember the first time his aunt had told him to make breakfast, and he did remember the first time he realized that he actually did have a mother and father—his aunt and uncle had been talking about 'that no-good, layabout James Potter', and by a complicated process of reasoning, he had decided that James Potter must have been his father.

About a year ago, his relatives had stopped taking Harry with them when they went out. For some reason, Harry's every public appearance was swamped with strangely-apparelled wellwishers. Petunia was tired of her precious Dudley and Edith being overshadowed by their unnatural and shrimpy cousin, so she simply left him at home.

Harry didn't mind. As soon as they left every day, he rushed to finish his chores. Then, carefully, he eased into the sitting room and took one of the books off the showcase. He was very careful to always put them back in the correct order, even though the Dursleys hardly ever looked at the shelf, much less read the books. The pictures and words painted a portrait of a world outside Number Four, Privet Drive, and Harry was glad to be able to escape to that world for an hour every day.

And thus, a childhood that was otherwise barren was given a saving grace, and some things that might have otherwise been true were averted, and Harry Potter became a different person than he might have otherwise been.


End file.
